Top Trends Of 2014

Each November, the Specialty Equipment Marketing Association (SEMA) Show in Las Vegas serves to showcase new products from the top automotive brands in the industry. The show has long garnered the attention of both original equipment manufacturers and the media, as it often sets trends for the market for the year to come. While last year’s hot-rodding themes were immediately apparent, we had to brainstorm a bit to see what this year’s show might foretell for 2014.

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C7 Stingrays

This one we saw coming. Chevrolet’s new Corvette Stingray has been a hit with every media outlet that’s climbed into the entirely redesigned sports car. The performance is there, the look is stunning, and it ushered in a new generation of direct-injection small-block, so it was only natural for the Stingray to be used as the test bed for Gen V V8 performance. Edelbrock featured a Stingray in its booth, and Chevrolet brought two, one from the upcoming Transformers 4 and another celebrating the video-game franchise Gran Turismo. The show floor also had its share of C7s, including a wild, baby-blue widebody from Forgiato.

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Surf Wagons

The ’50s- and ’60s-style surf machines were back at SEMA, with several woodies filling the Central hall. Our favorite was the Suburban built by Roadster Shop for Mr. Gasket. It’s powered by a fuel-injected 502 big-block, features a hardwood interior to match the two longboards on the roof, and wears custom-mixed waterborne metallic green that was sprayed by paint guru Charley Hutton.

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Delivery Vans

Top Gear USA host Rutledge Wood brought his Chevrolet Kurbmaster van with its new, custom dash to SEMA. Rutledge couldn’t believe that not only was there another Kurbmaster at this years’ show, but also it was parked less than 50 feet away from his, stealing his thunder with polished body panels. There were several more delivery vans both inside and out, including an art deco Divco (above) and a chopped FedEx box van from Mobsteel.

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iPads and Touchscreens

This one also seemed inevitable. Aftermarket EFI systems have moved to touchpads, and late-model tuners have been putting them in show cars for years, so naturally they’ll find their way into older cars. Android and iOS apps can provide a lot of helpful solutions; the problem is building a car interior around a tablet that will be completely obsolete by the time you do your first burnout. Keeping the technology in a modular, easily replaceable panel that still fits into the car’s interior will be the challenge. We like the Hypersilver ’88 Mustang hatchback that Muscle Mustang & Fast Fords assembled for its 25th anniversary just in time for SEMA. Its understated interior and silver exterior don’t muddy the simplicity that is a Fox-body Mustang, with the tablet adding all of the flexibility to control the audio system, navigate, and do anything you could ask a smartphone to do, while using a larger, easier-to-read format.

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Decorative Boost

Freiburger coined this term while at SEMA 2013, as it seemed a lot of cars had more engine than they’d ever possibly need, and rather than going with cubic inches, the trend seemed to be adding massive blowers or a whole lot of turbocharger plumbing to make your engine look cool. It’s sort of a bit of Pro Street coming back to the show-car scene; we don’t mind some excess every now and then, as long as it’s usable.

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Bold Graphics on Pro Touring Cars

We saw several cars with graphics that took up a big chunk of the sheetmetal and didn’t mimic anything the factory ever produced. Sometimes it was a distraction that took away from the lines of the car, other times it made us look at the car in a different way.

5 Engine Trends for 2014

NASCAR

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NASCAR engines were big at the 2012 SEMA Show, and it continued this year. Holley’s Terminator EFI boasts of its NASCAR heritage, and we spotted several Chevrolet R07 race engines on the show floor. When Chevrolet gets its next NASCAR V8 approved, maybe we’ll see this engine in more road-going cars.

LT1

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Rumor had it that Chevrolet’s direct-injection Gen V V8s would be impossible to crack, yet SEMA was full of parts for the new ’14 GM trucks and the C7 Stingray. Chevrolet teased an LT1 crate engine, Comp Cams had several cams, Edelbrock was showing off its new E-Force superchargers, and Lingenfelter had a Magnuson blown, 720hp, 414-cube LT1 on display that uses an extra set of traditional port injectors to kick in when the direct-injection system reaches its limit.

Engines in Disguise

This one’s a triple, although perhaps we were fooled more than that. First is the 427 SOHC look-alike in the Kindig-It ’65 Ford Galaxie (above). The cam covers hint at SOHC Ford, but the Edelbrock supercharger gives it away as a Coyote 5.0L. Well, so do the cam covers, as they actually say “5.0L” on them under the Ford oval.

Next up is a Chevrolet that claims it’s a 409 (top right). The iconic valve covers of the Chevrolet W engines would lead you to believe the stickers aren’t lying, but check out the exhaust ports. The center exhaust ports on a W engine would be siamesed, as they are on a Gen 1 small-block. Finally, we’ve got a late-model 6.4L Hemi (bottom right) that’s pretending it’s an early 392. This engine is in Jesse Greening’s Valiant that sports an unrestored exterior.

Big Boost

Last year, we noted that 1,000 hp is the new 500 hp, as several show cars were claiming four-digit power levels. This year, at least two cars claimed 2,000 hp, and others claimed more than 1,500 hp. Most of the time, they got there with lots of cubes backed up with lots of boost. Nelson Racing Engines had a Gen 1 Chevy small-block (top) and a second-gen Hemi (above) with twin turbos, while we also saw twin-turbo SRT Vipers (above right) and a Mike Moran twin-turbo 540 big-block Chevy (right) in Gil Lossi’s bubble-top Impala.

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Cross-Ram Intake Manifolds

Perched right on top of the engine, the induction system is usually the first thing you see when you peek under a hood, and at SEMA, where grabbing attention is paramount, cross-ram intakes were big. We spotted small-block Chevy, LS, Mercury-Edsel-Lincoln (MEL), and small-block Ford engines all sporting cross-ram intakes. While the most common sight was individual throttle bodies, the MEL engine in Dennis Varni’s Studebaker woody (lower right) uses dual throttle bodies. Astute HOT ROD readers might recognize the engine from the cover of our June ’59 issue.

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Matte and Semigloss Metallic Paint

ICON, the Los Angeles–based company known for its turnkey restomods of both classic 4x4s and cars, displayed its new TR series, based on a Chevrolet Thriftmaster. Naturally, it was painted with a matte metallic, continuing its trend, but other manufacturers kept it going, including Chevrolet, which debuted an SS sedan customized with input from NASCAR’s Jeff Gordon.

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Carbon-Fiber Bodywork

Like many technologies that trickle down from the aerospace industry, carbon-fiber seems to be gaining traction. Anvil Auto and Ringbrothers displayed ponycar replacement panels, with Ringbrothers going all the way to create a full widebody ’65–’66 Mustang fastback.

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Wide Fenders and Bodies

From Brian Hobaugh’s Optima Ultimate Street Car Invitational– winning ’65 Corvette to Ringbrothers carbon-fiber Mustang fastback, to a slew of late-models like the Challenger below, wide fenders were big at SEMA. The late-model cars took it to an extreme, but we were especially fond of Tim Allen’s subtle, Yunick-inspired ’68 Camaro that featured slightly widened fenders to tuck in more rubber.

Trends We Want to See Next Year

Performance tires in 15- and 16-inch muscle-car sizes. Is it impossible to have tall sidewalls and at least some inkling of performance

Recasting vintage aluminum and magnesium speed parts. Edelbrock has been leading the charge by producing new parts for engines that haven’t been on dealer lots for decades. Why not keep it going and bring back some ’60s wheel designs or some of Mickey Thompson’s intakes? Some Pontiac pieces, perhaps?

More Ford Coyote swaps. It’s likely we missed a few, but we only spotted a handful of new 5.0Ls this year. Swap parts are out there, and so are early Mustang suspensions that allow for the wide engines, so hopefully we’ll see more next year.

Rally-inspired ’60s cars. We really liked seeing the African Safari Mercury Comet at our Homecoming show, and we obviously have a soft spot for the Hot Rod Special Ranchero. The bold graphics turn heads, and the tall stance allows for a lot of fun driving without bashing oil pans.

AMCs. We’re calling it now. AMCs will be the hot cars of SEMA 2014. Pro-Touring Hornets, GT Javelins, and period-correct, muscle-era Ramblers are the wave of the future. Maybe we’re crazy, or maybe we’re just tired of seeing so many Scions and Subarus.

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Land Speed

Alan Johnson’s gorgeous Studebaker would be right at home at SEMA even if it weren’t a Bonneville veteran, and it wasn’t alone; we found several salt missiles in attendance. Mickey Thompson Tires brought out the quad-Pontiac-powered Challenger I, Flowmaster put Turbonator (a turbine-powered streamliner that doesn’t even have a muffler) in its booth, and it had a salty neighbor with the flathead-powered Kent Fuller streamliner just a few yards away. Speaking of Alan Johnson’s Stude, there were at least three bullet-nosed Studebakers inside SEMA, which isn’t enough to really call it a trend.

Paint Trends of SEMA 2013

It wasn’t until we looked at all of our photos after we’d returned home that we began to pick up the paint trends. Digital camo and tessellations were big in vinyl wraps, so was brushed-metal-looking vinyl, while traditional pinstriping stayed strong. The major color trend was green, which Chevrolet used on several of its cars, and was featured prominently in PPG’s Carnival of Color booth, as well as on vintage muscle cars and imports.